In Her Name: The Last War

by Michael R. Hicks

  “Josh,” Vladimir Penkovsky, the head of the Terran Intelligence Service asked Joshua Sabine, the civilian Defense Minister, “Do you really believe this?”

  Sighing, Sabine nodded. He’d been present when Burke gave her briefing. He had asked some hard, hard questions, and she’d had straight answers for him. And none of them were encouraging. “Yes, Vladimir,” he said, almost grudgingly. “I believe it.” He raised a hand as Penkovsky opened his mouth to interrupt him. “I know that it’s not ironclad until Sato is debriefed and the engineering team goes over the ship with a fine tooth comb. But I think we’ve got enough solid evidence to feel confident that Aurora did indeed have a first contact encounter, and that this so-called ‘Kreelan Empire’ poses a clear and present danger to the human sphere.”

  Several other members of the council began to talk at once.

  “Enough,” President McKenna said quietly, immediately stilling the babble. A tall black woman from what had once been the state of Mississippi in the United States, she never had to raise her voice. Born in poverty, orphaned at an early age, and raised in a series of foster homes, no one would have ever thought she would make it to the highest leadership position on the face of planet Earth. But her resolution was as solid as her intellect was keen, and she had overcome every obstacle that life had ever placed before her. This one, while potentially greater by unknown orders of magnitude, was no different in her mind. “Like most of the others in this room and elsewhere,” she went on, “I don’t want to believe this. But we’ve always known that there might come a day when we encountered another sentient race. Everyone has always hoped that such a civilization would be a peaceful one.” She glanced at Tiernan. “But we also knew that it might not be. And we can’t afford to ignore what Sato brought back. Not with only eighteen months to prepare for an invasion.”

  “Our options are limited, Madam President,” the Secretary of State, Hamilton Barca, rumbled. Looking more like a professional football linebacker than a top graduate of New Harvard’s law school, Barca’s appearance often put his counterparts off-balance in negotiations, while his endless patience in diplomatic discussions could wear down even the most difficult negotiator. “Earth has a trade relationship with Keran, of course, and full diplomatic ties, but no military treaties,” he explained. “Even if they believe this,” he nodded at the screen where they had just seen the proposed press report, “we don’t have any mutual support agreements with them, and they don’t even have a real spacegoing navy. It’s going to take a lot of time to-”

  “Hamilton,” McKenna interrupted, something she almost never did to anyone, “I’m aware of what you’re going to be facing on the diplomatic front. But if we believe the information we have, and I do, based on what Admiral Tiernan has presented today, we simply don’t have time for normal negotiations. And if we don’t act, and act decisively, the invasion won’t stop at Keran. They showed us with Aurora that they could as easily attack Earth.”

  “It’s a deception,” Penkovsky interjected. “What if they want us to do exactly that? They can lead us into pouring our resources into defending a second-string colony world, and then just appear here and gut one of the core worlds.”

  The room once again descended into a babble of arguing.

  “We need to dust off the Human Sphere Defense Agreement,” Barca’s voice boomed out.

  His remark not only silenced the argument, but elicited a series of groans from around the table. The Human Sphere Defense Agreement, or HSDA, had been proposed years before after a similar scare that had turned out to be a false alarm. While the details of the proposal were complex, it basically would put all the spacegoing navies of the human sphere under unified military control and create an independent force of marines. The main sticking point, of course, was who would then be in control of the new joint military structure. Just like the countries of Earth had been a few centuries before, not all human-settled worlds were democracies, and not all of the world-states got along well (even many of the democracies did not get along well). The HSDA would never come about unless a unified political structure to control it was formed. None of the world-states, including Earth, wanted to give up any of their sovereignty to an inter-system government, and many planets had weak or nonexistent planetary governments, as well. The only reason Earth’s Terran Planetary Government functioned as well as it did was that the nation-states that had guided Earth’s destiny for so many years were greatly weakened in the series of wars before the Diaspora, when much of Earth’s population fled the turmoil to found new colonies. Earth’s surviving governments realized that the only hope of long-term survival and renewed prosperity lay in forming a strong global government. It was not an easy or bloodless process, but eventually had put Earth diplomatically and economically far ahead of the colonies whose governments remained decentralized.

  “I agree,” President McKenna said, much to the chagrin of most of the members of the cabinet. “This is what the HSDA was meant for, but before there wasn’t a real threat to make it stick. This time there is.”

  “If anyone else buys this story,” Penkovsky said under his breath.

  McKenna fixed him with a burning glare. “I don’t care if anyone else believes it,” she grated. “If half of what Admiral Tiernan said was true, if the aliens, these Kreelans, have technology that advanced, our entire species is at risk. We will spare no effort, none, to protect both ourselves and other human-settled worlds to the best of our ability.”

  “And that, Madam President,” Defense Minister Sabine said, “is the next big question. We’ve only got about one hundred warships with jump capability, ranging from corvettes on up to light cruisers and a handful of troop transports. Most of them are engaged in anti-piracy patrols in systems that don’t have their own navies, with three dozen or so in Earth space at any given time on home patrol or in refit.” Admiral Tiernan nodded in agreement. While the Terran Navy sported a big league title, it wasn’t nearly as large as any of the old major wet-fleet navies had been. Earth had never really had to fight anyone since the Diaspora, and so had never allocated a huge budget for defense.

  “We have quite a few ground troops,” General Jaswant Singh, Chief of the Terran Army Staff said. “We could easily deploy several divisions without seriously affecting our own defenses.”

  “It’s the same with us,” General Sharine Metz, commander of the Terran Aerospace Defense Force, said. “We could deploy at least six squadrons of interceptors for near-space defense, and cover the gap in Earth’s defenses by activating some reserve units to fill in.”

  Tiernan frowned. “The main obstacle is going to be lining up enough transport capacity to get our forces there and then keep them supplied,” he said. “We’ve only got a few assault carriers, enough to hold two full heavy divisions. The interceptors,” he glanced at Metz, “we’d have to take in on civilian freighters, so we’d have to get prior approval from Keran to get the squadrons on the ground and prepare them for combat.”

  McKenna nodded. None of this was a surprise to her. Everyone was still just trying to get used to the idea that there was another intelligent species out there that had decided to wage war on humanity for no apparent reason, and all they had right now were problems without solutions. She could listen to those who wanted to wait for more information, to see if this would just go away, but she wasn’t about to waste any time. Thinking about the strange “hourglass” of the planet Keran and the millions of people there, she knew they had precious little as it was. “Here are my orders,” she said formally, “and they are not subject to debate.” Everyone nodded. They’d heard that tone of voice before during the major economic crisis that McKenna’s first administration had faced, when the global economy was in deep peril and she had redefined the meaning of personal leadership. “First,” she said, turning to Tiernan, “I want you to run the story your pet journalist has put together. We’ll have a certain amount of apprehension among the populace, but I want to let our people know what we�
��re up against. I’ll hold a press conference immediately after the first story runs, and I want periodic updates as we learn more.

  “Second, we will make all of our findings from the survivor’s debriefing public once the next of kin of the Aurora’s crew have been notified, and we will honor any reasonable requests by other governments to send observers for independent study of whatever the ship brought back.” That raised a few eyebrows, but no one said anything.

  “Third, we will offer any and all assistance that we can to Keran. And even if they won’t accept direct military assistance, I want an expeditionary force prepared for a rapid insertion into the system if things go south and they need help. If we can help stop the Kreelans there, so much the better.

  “Fourth, we will call a special session of the Interstellar Forum and refloat the HSDA. I don’t expect it’s going to be adopted, but I want it out there again, fresh in everyone’s mind. Because if Keran falls, everyone’s going to be worried about who will be next and how they can defend themselves, and HSDA will at least give us something to start with.

  “Fifth, I want a plan to get our economy on a wartime footing. The red tape and all the rest of the bullshit goes out the door.” Several members of the cabinet flinched at the expletive. McKenna rarely cursed. “We need ships, weapons, and manpower, and we need them fast. We also need public support for this, both financially and politically.” She paused, her face turning grim. “And when we have the plan together, I’m going to go before the Terran Congress and petition for a draft.”

  Defense Minister Sabine whistled through his teeth. “That’s going to be an awfully tough sell, Madam President,” he said quietly. The president had complete authority to do everything she’d said except for instituting a draft for obligatory military service. For that, congressional approval was required in the form of a two-thirds majority vote. And that was tough to get on the easy legislation, Sabine thought sourly. “And if we get into a massive arms buildup, a lot of our neighbors are going to wonder if we’re not thinking of doing a little empire-building ourselves.”

  “Good,” McKenna said. “If we can leverage their fear of us, then so be it. But I want us to be transparent about what we’re doing. I want other governments to know why we’re doing it, and we’ll offer to help them do the same. But I don’t care if they build ships and weapons for the wrong reason; it will still help our collective defense when the enemy comes. As for Congress, that’s up to me.” She looked around the room. “Let me be perfectly clear, my friends,” she told them in a voice laced with steel. “This is not a time for half-measures. I’ll accept the resignation now from anyone who feels they can’t get behind this one hundred percent from the start. Because as of today, after learning of the unprovoked attack on Aurora, the systematic murder of her crew, and the direct threat made to a human world, even if not our own, I plan to ask the Terran Congress for an official declaration of war against the Kreelan Empire.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Among the countless planets that orbited the ten thousand suns of the Empire, many were such as this: great barren rocks that were host to gigantic seas of the matrix material controlled by the builders. From this they created the smallest to the greatest of the Empire’s physical constructs, even entire worlds. For if the Empress willed it, it would be done.

  A great task had She given the builders here and on other worlds, even as the strangers, the humans, were fighting and dying before Tesh-Dar’s eyes. A new fleet would be created for Her warriors, to carry them forth into battle with their new enemy among the stars.

  But this fleet was not meant to seek out and expunge the human animals from the Universe, for even a small task force of Her modern warships could accomplish that menial task. Instead, the builders had to reach back into the Books of Time, far back, to recall the designs created by their ancestors over one hundred thousand human years before. They sought designs that predated even the founding of the First Empire, for that was the level of technology that they sought to match. The bulk of the Imperial Fleet would remain as it was, the physical sword and shield of the Empire, but the new fleet would be roughly equal to the human ships they expected to face. And if the humans brought more advanced technology to bear in the coming encounter, so much the better for the added challenge Her Children would face.

  Standing on the crest of a low mountain that held a great underground city, Tesh-Dar looked out across a giant lake of the black matrix. Above her the sky was bright with the artificial sun created aeons ago to light and warm this barren planet. It was a sterile wasteland of a world, useless for colonization, but ideal for the purposes to which it had been put. Much of its surface mass had been converted to the black matrix millennia before, and had been used as She required. A jarring landscape of violently upthrust rocks and ancient impact craters, the builders and the others of Her Children who labored here found solace and beauty in the monumental city beneath Tesh-Dar’s feet, where the graceful domes and spires of buildings and dwellings lay under open skies and were surrounded by forests as if they were still on the Homeworld.

  While Tesh-Dar’s own powers were beyond the comprehension of any builder ever born, their powers left her with a keen sense of respect and awe. She watched as thousands of them stood in a rough oval nearly a human kilometer in length and half as wide, their arms out with palms turned inward to the center of the oval. She could sense the buildup of energy as the builder mistresses, those oldest and most powerful among the builders here, harnessed and guided the power of the acolytes. Other such groups of builders stood in similar ovals farther out; some groups were larger and some smaller, depending on the type of ship they had been called upon to build, with all of them near the shore of the matrix lake.

  Tesh-Dar gasped as the power of the nearest group surged, and the surface of the nearby matrix lake began to stir. Its black, featureless surface suddenly began to ripple, and then the first particles began to separate from the depths of infinite black and float into the air. Moving faster and faster, the particles flew toward the center of the oval, the stream of airborne matrix becoming thicker until it blocked her view of the other groups of builders who worked beyond.

  After momentarily hanging in the air in a nebulous cloud, the particles began to coalesce, and Tesh-Dar saw the first translucent shapes appear in mid-air where the ship’s internal systems would be. At first only as thick as a single matrix particle, the primitive internal components of the ship gradually took form, even as more particles began to form some of the outer hull segments.

  The great priestess marveled at the sleekness of the emerging design. Even with primitive spacecraft as ancient as this Her Children had fused the beauty of form with function, so unlike the designs of human ships she had seen from the extracted logs of the human craft. Unlike the boxy and cylindrical utilitarian shapes of the human vessels, this craft was formed with elegant curves and shapely proportions pleasing to the eye, as well as deadly to its foes. Kreelan engineering was as much art as it was science in all that they did, and warships were no exception.

  “In Her name,” breathed Tesh-Dar’s First, a fiery young warrior named Kamal-Utai. This was her first visit to such a place, and Tesh-Dar smiled inwardly at the fascination felt by her apprentice, for she found it no less enthralling after seeing similar scenes countless times before. “Even before the days of the First Empress were we masters of the stars.”

  Tesh-Dar knew that it would take the builders weeks of painstaking labor to finish the ship that was now taking form, and even more time to complete the others being built for the new fleet, but she was satisfied with their interpretation of the Empress’s will. It would take yet more preparation to train the warriors who would crew the ships, for they would have to learn everything anew. She did not envy the task of the ship mistresses who now studied the Books of Time translating from the Old Tongue the information on how to operate these primitive vessels. But she herself would be among the many to receive their tutelage, for Te
sh-Dar was to lead this first campaign. Piloting the ships, operating the weapons, learning appropriate battle tactics: there was so very much to learn, and she looked forward to every moment of it.

  In the coming war with the human horde, Her warriors would be evenly matched against the enemy. It would be a glorious opportunity to bring honor to the Empress for the warriors chosen to fight. Even now, countless arenas around the Empire were filled with cries of fury and the clash of steel as warriors fought in ritual combat for the right to slay, or be slain by, the human animals. Such combats would continue for many weeks, for many tens of thousands of warriors would be involved in the invasion of the human world, Keran, and many more would fight in the cycles to come. The attack on this first world had no particular strategic value, but was merely to provoke the humans into a fierce response. For this was not a battle or a war to be won or lost: it was simply to be fought for the honor and glory it brought to Her, to the Empress. And Her warriors would keep on fighting through the remaining centuries left to their dying race, should that be the will of the Empress.

  With the Bloodsong burning in her veins and her body tingling with the energy unleashed by the builders, Tesh-Dar watched in silent wonder the birth of the fleet that would soon be hers to command.

  * * *

  Seated behind a lavish teak desk in his main office at the Keran Embassy, Ambassador Faisul bin Sultan, Keran’s diplomatic representative to Earth, listened quietly as Secretary of State Hamilton Barca explained the situation as it was viewed by the Terran Government. Less than twenty-four hours had elapsed since Aurora flashed into existence next to Africa Station, and the shock waves of Stephanie Guillaume’s news report and the president’s press conference were spreading through human space with every successive jump of the communications couriers that carried the broadcasts. Ambassador bin Sultan had, of course, seen both the news release and the president’s press statements: Barca had called him beforehand to make sure the news did not catch him by surprise, and to schedule a meeting as quickly as possible at the Keran Embassy.